29/04/2026
What are countries?
We are all taught geography at school. We all know that every piece of land has been given a name that we refer to as the country it exists in.
But who decided what area of land should be incorporated into which country?
Who decided what country or nation a group of people belonged to?
Did you know, countries didn't really exist up until around 100 years ago?
Before this time we had kingdoms. An area of land occupied by a specific group who referred to themselves as members of that particular kingdom.
Take England as an example, there were numerous kingdoms spread throughout the land, each with their own leader, distinct customs, traditions and culture that were separate or different from those of neighbouring kingdoms around them.
This was the same all over the world until one day, someone decided that we should all unite for the benefit of the nation, to defend our nation against other nations. In order to protect ourselves from powerful kingdoms looking to invade our lands. Having a unified nation of kingdoms helped achieve that security.
And that's when countries were born.
The kingdoms of England, Wales and Scotland all united to form the United Kingdom that we know today.
Before 1914, you could travel across the whole world without even needing a passport or ID.
This originally started in France, before this happened, only 2% of the population living in what we know today as France actually spoke french. There was a complete mixture of language and dialect used in the region prior to this unification of french kingdoms.
And now today we see the consequences of land that has been carved up into nations where the people within those nations don't necessarily belong to the same cultural make up of the majority of people living there.
An example of this would be somewhere like Lebanon.
Originally predominantly Christian people lived in the area, and a few areas where Muslims had also settled. They viewed themselves as different kingdoms or tribes until some bright spark decided to draw a line around them and call it Lebanon, bringing all the people within that area together as one nation. Christians and Muslims as part of one nation. 2 very different cultures, different ways of life, and characteristics.
In Africa and the Middle East, the land was carved up by British and French bureaucrats to divide resources between themselves.
What was the consequence of that?
Border disputes, civil war, religious extremism.